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Peter Berkos was the sound effects editor on the Battlestar Galactica 1978 series. In 2004 Peter Berkos was awarded a lifetime achievement Oscar for his outstanding career in sound editing. For Battlestar Galactica he was responsible for the sound effects of the laser guns, the barking of Muffit and of course the distinctive voice of the Cylons. He was interviewed some years back about his career and how the sounds on Battlestar Galactica were created.: "Battlestar Galactica fell into my lap. When it was ready for post-production, I was not working on a feature film. I met Glen Larson, a man I had great respect for, we hit it off and I was invited to be part of the team. I was asked to run the rough cut of the film, which had no sound refinements and conjure up appropriate sounds for the various space crafts, lasers, interiors, exteriors, robotics for animals, etc. Every episode of Battlestar Galactica presented a new challenge. Glen [Larson] had a keen, inventive mind. The battleships, the Vipers, the Cylon craft, various modes of transportation were established early and used week after week. However, each week I had to create new fantasy sounds: radar mine fields, celestial castles, galactic night-club atmosphere, actually, too many to recall. For the Cylon voice,a 'vocoder' was used in tandem with a companion sound, I seem to remember it was a synthesizer. Only one actor was used for all Cylon voices to keep the sound consistent. I was in the recording studio during the taping to insure a monotone reading. Then in the editing room to introduce the dialogue onto the sound track and finally in the dubbing studio to combine the recorded dialogue and the synthesizer through the vocoder. I created the sound effect for the moving eye ;a simple electrical sound on a loop. I can tell you how I got the sound of laser guns. I started with the snap of a bullwhip. We recorded sharp cracks, which we expanded electronically (It was so long ago that don't remember the name of the instrument we used). We then fed the elongated sound through the mixing panel to add highs. Frank Warner, who did the sound effects for Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, used the same principal, however, instead of a bullwhip, he found a telephone pole with a heavy cable that extended to the ground. Frank recorded the sound of hitting the cable with a hammer and recording the sound. He then worked with that sound at the panel to turn it into laser shots. When you create sound effects, you find your own starting point. "